Monday, May 10, 2010

The document calls for the elimination of the Department of Education and the Federal Reserve, demands an investigation of "collusion between government and industry in the global warming myth," suggests the adoption of "Austrian Economics," declares that "'Freedom of Religion' does not mean 'freedom from religion'" (which I guess makes atheism illegal), insists that "healthcare is not a right," calls for the abrogation of the "UN Treaty on Rights of the Child" and the "Law Of The Sea Treaty" and declares that we must resist "efforts to create a one world government."

The Law of the Sea Treaty?

Why yes. The Heritage Foundation is opposed to it. In 2004, the deep thinkers at the Foundation were still invoking Reagan's opposition to the law 22 yrs. earlier. That took a lot of thought & "research," didn't it?

Environmental and Economic IssuesFormer President Reagan refused to sign the Treaty in 1982 due to its innate conflict with basic free-market principles (e.g., private property, free enterprise, and competition).

And admire Maine's reactionary activists here. If we can get the death panels going soon enough, none of these morbid jerks will be alive to vote in 2012, and all the money saved can go to public-funded abortions & non-abstinence sex education.*Added later: Read the platform. A hoot, & so well-written & clearly-expressed.

*Not a joke. Not sarcasm. Let them fucking die already, if they're so miserable & oppressed. And the money can go to our disability fund too.

The White House has flatly stated that she is not gay, which could prove a tad embarrassing if the open secret of her lesbianism is confirmed at some point. If she's a lesbian, it is going to become public knowledge, and the White House will simply have some more egg on its already yoke-splattered [sic] face.

We wouldn't want to guess what spatters typist Bryan Fischer's face, if you know what we mean.

She cannot be kept closeted not only from the public but from the inquiring minds of the media. They have a solemn responsibility to do one thing: ask her directly and openly and in front of the American people: Are you a lesbian?

A refusal to answer is a tacit admission of guilt. But she may not be able publicly to deny she's a lesbian, likely because it's true. She may not be able to admit it either, because it could cost her a Supreme Court post. So she's likely to refuse to answer the question at all, and the only plausible explanation for her evasion would be because rumors of her lesbianism aren't rumors at all but based in fact.

Think about it for a minute. If you were falsely accused of engaging in sexually aberrant behavior, would you waste a single minute challenging such a scurrilous rumor?

The editorial staff here wouldn't waste any time at all challenging it. (No such thing as bad publicity. We realize Fischer probably meant "would you waste a single minute before challenging such a scurrilous rumor?" but he can't spell, so why would we expect clear typing?

Perhaps diaper sex w/ a prostitute is OK. We'd have to assume it's not "aberrant," or there would certainly be a call for Louisiana Senator Vitter's resignation included here:

We cannot afford to have another sexually abnormal individual in a position of important civic responsibility ...

So it isn’t just contraception that delays childbearing in liberal states, and it isn’t just a foolish devotion to abstinence education that leads to teen births and hasty marriages in conservative America. It’s also a matter of how plausible an option abortion seems, both morally and practically, depending on who and where you are.

Whether it’s attainable for most Americans or not, the “blue family” model clearly works: it leads to marital success and material prosperity, and it’s well suited to our mobile, globalized society.

By comparison, the “red family” model can look dysfunctional — an uneasy mix of rigor and permissiveness, whose ideals don’t always match up with the facts of contemporary life.

But it reflects something else as well: an attempt, however compromised, to navigate post-sexual revolution America without relying on abortion.

Why isn't it "just contraception?" The "sexual revolution" was predicated on the availability of reliable contraception, not abortion, which remained illegal during the early days of said revolution. Perhaps Mr. Douthat should take his bullshit to First Things, where his brain-dead Catholicism won't interfere w/ the facts of contemporary life.

Brought to our short attention span, interesting musing on the 'Bagger zeitgeist. We don't agree completely either, but it's a good look at the symptoms & some of the causes of a distrust of government in general & unwarranted self-confidence by Americans, neither of which are any damn help. We're only read it once, but there was little mention of foreign policy, & we don't remember any mention of Vietnam, not even here, where the exact time of lessening trust in gov't. is given.

Ever since the Seventies, social scientists have puzzled over the fact that, despite greater affluence and relative peace, Americans have far less trust in their government than they had up until the mid-Sixties.

Always the possibility of the TEA crowd killing their young, however. By inbreeding, perhaps.

People with higher degrees who care about food and wine, support gay rights, and want few children but good Internet connections have been gravitating to urban centers on the two coasts, while churchgoing families that drive everywhere, socialize with relatives, and send their kids to state universities have been heading to the growing exurbs of the southern and mountain states.

Can anything more repugnant be imagined?

Further Darwinism:

There are plenty of things wrong with the way medicine is practiced in the United States, but it does not follow from this that anybody can cure himself. Nonetheless, a growing number of us have become our own doctors and pharmacists, aided by Internet search engines that substitute for refereed medical journals, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Centers for Disease Control.

The trends are not encouraging. Because of irrational fear-mongering on the Web, the percentage of unvaccinated American children, while thankfully still low, has been rising steadily in the twenty-one states that now allow personal exemptions for unspecified “philosophical and personal reasons.” This is significant: the chance of unvaccinated children getting measles, to take just one example, is twenty-two to thirty-five times higher than that of immunized children.13Americans currently spend over four billion dollars a year on unregulated herbal medicines, despite total ignorance about their effectiveness, correct dosage, and side effects. And of course, many dangerous medicines banned in the United States can now be purchased online from abroad, not to mention questionable medical procedures for those who can afford the airfare.14

Americans are and have always been credulous skeptics. They question the authority of priests, then talk to the dead15; they second-guess their cardiologists, then seek out quacks in the jungle. Like people in every society, they do this in moments of crisis when things seem hopeless. They also, unlike people in other societies, do it on the general principle that expertise and authority are inherently suspect.

Well, we can't deny that the prospect of a quiverful household of un-vaccinated spawn having a simultaneous mini-epidemic cheers us.

We can't be bothered to pick more of it apart (Long & has FOOTNOTES!!) or even to seek the good parts confirming our prejudices, but this is probably the newest, most interesting point arrived at.

Historically, populist movements use the rhetoric of class solidarity to seize political power so that “the people” can exercise it for their common benefit. American populist rhetoric does something altogether different today. It fires up emotions by appealing to individual opinion, individual autonomy, and individual choice, all in the service of neutralizing, not using, political power. It gives voice to those who feel they are being bullied, but this voice has only one, Garbo-like thing to say: I want to be left alone.

Just turn the gov't. over to the non-elite business interests. Please. We want it that way. Baaaa.

President Obama will nominate Solicitor General Elena Kagan as the nation's 112th justice, choosing his own chief advocate before the Supreme Court to join it in ruling on cases critical to his view of the country's future, Democrats close to the White House said on Sunday.

No More Mister Nice Blog found a rare one, & apparently local. The actual post by the actual loon, represented below in his Patrick Henry incarnation. (Loons not really that hard to spot when they're in full feather.)

If you really wanted to kill the conservative movement, slow it down, cripple it, what would you do? Sure, you could trot out your bay area liberal, Barbara Boxer, with her union machine and her record of victories and her treacherous campaign tactics, but---really, she isn't much of a Goliath. She looks a bit more like the wicked witch of the west, with a few flying monkeys hovering behind her. At heart, I don't think the voters of California really care much for her shrill scolding. If someone is brave enough to throw a little water on her, she'll melt.

Barbara Boxer isn't the problem. Our problem is our own fear--the fear that is sewn [sic] amongst us by the enemy within.

We're especially amused at "treacherous campaign tactics," as the Senator has soundly trounced her last two opponents, neither of whom required "treacherous" tactics. We appreciate Patrick Henry pointing out her "record of victories," as well as which of her policies, positions & so forth are so unpopular she'll be melting. Fuck, Jim Pat, you practically pissed right on her, is she melting yet? Pretty brave of you, though. Are you as brave as Mickey Kaus? He's been tossing water in the Senator's direction, if not actually on her, & is mouthing the same "union machine" line.

The problem of the cowardly inner enemy (Who, we'd been thinking, was home-grown terror-sympathizers & socialist Democrats just like us. What a surprise.) is, ta-da, Stalinism. Purity tests, & then the purges, to insure the inevitable dialectical victory of socialismconservatism!

You look with contempt on a "purity test," because that, after all, would make the conservative cause true, simple, and victorious.

The enemy of the socialist, the radical environmentalist, the globalist, and the corporate monopolist is mental and moral clarity.

Yep. Conservatism can only be failed, & we must be certain that the new socialistconservative man will not fail it.

We haven't even mentioned the spurned-lover lambasting applied to Sarah Palin, & the general apocalyptic tone ("the enemy") among other high points, because we are lazy, & Steve M. took on the other good parts admirably. (Not to imply in any way that we would have gone any further had he not, of course.)

The Daily Dish offers a selection of insults from a Vatican diplomat to

John Wojnowski, who stood on Masachusetts Avenue for years with a placard accusing the Vatican of covering up the rape of children. Like many formerly mocked as a crank, he now seems prescient and on-target - so on target that each time the papal nuncio to the US, Archbishop Pietro Sambi walks past him in his new protest point, Embassy Row, he lashes out. Here are the following alleged insults hurled by this prince of the church at a man who claims to have been sexually abused by a priest at the age of 15:

"You are a loser. You are a loser with a camera. You are a total loser." (Sei un fallito. Sei un fallito come fotografo. Sei un fallito totale) March 19, 2010

"I do not speak with crazies" (No parlo con i pazzi, in response to Wojnowski's request in Italian for a brief chat with the Nuncio) May 3, 2009

"Imbecile. Cretin. I am ashamed of you, a gift to the enemies of the Church." (Deficiente cretino per mi vergogno di te, un dono hai nemici de la chiessa) March 21, 2009

"Cretin" (Cretino) Feb. 18, 2009

"Tool. Paid idiot." (Strumentallizzato. Idiota pagato.) Jan. 19, 2009

"Idiot" (Idiota) Jan. 10, 2009

"I am ashamed of you. You are a pig" (Mi vergogno di te. Sei un porco, Sambi's answer to Wojnowski's question: Excellency, are you ashamed to dress as a priest?) Dec. 28, 2008

We've already heard it several times over the telebision: "Miracle of Birth."

Uh, NO! Not a miracle. There are millions, possibly billions of births in the animal world daily. This is not a miracle, brain-dead, cliché-accepting, loser idiots, it is simply something that happens. A lot. Every day & everywhere.

The blind acceptance of such non-stop bullshit is an excellent example of why your species is headed for oblivion. The only adaptation humanoids have made is to develop large brains, yet most of you are incapable of using yours effectively. When a species loses the ability to use the tools it has evolved, the party is over. So long, killer apes.

And why is there never any mention of the real miracle, death, w/o which we'd be stepping over & around morons piled up like so much dead wood, everywhere. Indeed, w/o the promise of death's eventual sweet release, we would have lost our patience & burned this sorry world of shit & pain to the ground a long time ago.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Found this in the vault today, some wks. after the actual 65th anniversary of the discovery of the "camps." Still V-E Day, though. The sort of delicate flower who might not want to look at dead, naked bodies being treated like dead, naked bodies is advised not to watch. We kid you not.

We'd been thinking about going out & getting some stuff, but the feeling went away w/o our having to lie down or anything. Therefore, as there will be no new shots for the immediate future, the remainder of the images captured on our outside world expedition last Mon.

A 17-year-old with a grudge against his former Long Island high school planned with his girlfriend to buy shotguns, enter his old school and indiscriminately shoot down students and teachers days before his ex-classmates were scheduled to graduate, police said yesterday.

The two teenagers extensively researched bomb making, attempted to buy a shotgun and set a June 10 date for the planned attack on Connetquot High School in Bohemia, Suffolk County police Sgt. Bill Doherty said.

[...]

The warning followed what police believe was a public proclamation of the boy's venom for his former classmates. After a car accident that led to the death of two students earlier this year, someone using the 17-year-old's name left messages on a Facebook memorial page expressing his satisfaction.

"He apparently has quite a bit of hatred for this class in general," Doherty said.

Crowley: He ought to really apologize for this vulgar and vile comment referencing the American people, and also try to give some sort of speech -- I know a lot of us have heard enough from the president already -- but he should try to put out some words that are going to make up for this kind of thing.

No, Monica, the President didn't reference "the American people." He was talking about a small part of the American people.

Neiwert has several examples of the Ignorance Alliance self-describing themselves as sack-suckers some time ago.

We always find the reactionary response of "EVIL!" amusing; it's been dragged out again by one of the self-righteous who no doubt believes himself to be the personification of yummy goodness.

Part the first was especially interesting to us; we mightn't have bothered abusing Gelernter just for re-forging of boilerplate had it not caught our eye.

(Fuck, rereading w/ intent to comprehend is painful, obviously & because we realize it will require us to type several sentences just for the first paragraph.

Ugh. Well, easiest out: Bold the stupidest parts.)

First: Suppose all these terrorists and terrorist hopefuls had in fact been run-of-the-mill madmen. What would that circumstance say about the age-old left-liberal dream of de-institutionalizing the insane? Are liberals ever wrong?

We (speaking here for each & every left-liberal) thought it might be a good idea to consider individual cases carefully, rather than automatically toss the loons into Bedlam because they are demon-possessed & evil. And (speaking for the truth here) we have a distinct memory of Calif. Gov. Ronald W. Reagan signing California's let-the-loons-out bill. Funny that Mr. Gelernter thinks this is a bad idea; the usual reaction of his neo-con ilk to spending money on social programs like warehousing the disabled & disturbed (And who the fuck isn't disturbed these days?) is that they make this good nation dangerously weak by siphoning funds from the national security state that, oddly enough, would just as soon have us all under 24-hr. surveillance in a national asylum.

Argh, three sentences already. (Equivalent to at least six sentences by a disciplined typist, so stop bitching about our bitching.)

Third: If reporters ever read their own words or listened to their own voices, they would stop repeating the ugly cliché (as they did yet again post-Times Square) that the Taliban (or gang X) has “claimed credit” for some revolting crime or attempted crime. Do we say that “The jury assigned credit to Joe Shmoe for beating up an old lady and kicking her dog down the stairs”? The word reporters are looking for is guilt. The Taliban have admitted guilt, once again, for an attempted mass murder. Do liberals ever listen to what they are saying?

Oh, just fucking stop. Now. This will go over as well as substituting "homicide bomber" for "suicide bomber." Do reactionaries ever listen to anything but the voices in their heads?

Now brace yourselves, here it comes:

The deeper point: The intellectual mainstream has long sought refuge from the concept of evil in the far easier-to-swallow idea of insanity. [...] the latest symptom--made worse (of course) by a phobic terror of bigotry--of the inability to look evil (and thus reality) in the face. The Obama administration has shown exactly the same incapacity in its dealings with the Iranian regime.

We see an even deeper point: The Obama administration has shown an incapacity to whip some good ol' fashion Bush-style shock & awe on the towelheads over there, what's wrong w/ them?

There may be more points to be made (Hell, we actually scrawled some notes, for the second or third time in three yrs. of typing for semi-public consumption; can't let that much effort go to waste.) but right now, five hrs. after starting this load, we intend to watch more tee vee & then pretend we're dead for about eight hrs. This can stand on its own for a while ...

The left-wing activist-blogger Matthew Yglesias, echoing the Obama White House view that a crisis is a terrible thing to waste, said the Wall Street meltdown offered a “real opportunity” for “massive socialism.”

Our working model of Goldberg's brain is a small & rather dusty library, limited to certain arcane interests, where each book/thought is hermetically sealed in a sort of Pandora's Box (though more likely a comic geek's plastic bag) so that no discrete idea comes into contact w/ another, as that could result in confusion, a moment of clarity or an anti-matter explosion.

Another possible Spongebrain model is that of an eight-yr. old: "Oh yeah? Well, I don't even think about you for months at a time!!"

That's right, to Catholic boy Hoft, ☠Death☠ should be ✞sacred✞. Sick fuck, but no real surprise. They worship the "mystery" of a walking corpse, you know, & their entire existence is predicated on dying & going to a retirement home w/ the corpse & his father.

Most People Carry Neanderthal DNA
Scientists have wrapped up a comparative study of human and Neanderthal genomes, and they've found that as much as 4 percent of most people's DNA can be traced back to the "big-brained and barrel-chested group."Read original story in Wall Street Journal | Thursday, May 6, 2010

PBS advises us to "cut and paste this code to embed this clip - it needs to stay all on one line." Easier said than done, tote bag mongers.

The vids, then, anyway. Newt w/ future wing-nut welfare recipients at the Heritage Foundation is a curiosity worth the look, though it may dull out as it goes on, being the Snoozehour & all.

Erik Prince may be the only wing-nut who could present an actual threat to anyone beyond the hundred or so victims of a random bombing at a gov't. bldg. Jeremy Scahill on Democracy Now! is on Xe/Blackwater & its leader like wrinkles on a cheap suit or any article of clothing we own.

We thought the "government takeover of health care" was absolutely worse than the Holocaust because it would lead to the old &/or wretched being death paneled. Yet now the guy who wanted to profit from the T.P. convention he set up some mos. ago in Nashville (And it would seem gawd is punishing them now, wouldn't it?) wants to cut your SSI check, as revealed in an on-line chat under the auspices of The Washington Post.

Okay, so some examples of what these are? The Tea Party and its "Taxpayers' Rights" predecessors always say this, but one person's waste is another person's lifeline. So I would like to know some concrete ideas of what programs meet these criteria.

Judson Phillips: Social security disability is the first one I would go through. Down in the south, many people refer to them as crazy checks. We have lawyers advertising right next to the personal injury lawyers, saying they will get you SSI disability. The program is rife with fraud.

Phillips then leaves on a high note:

Liberals are just as American as you are and you and your movement has no right to question people's patriotism or Americanness just because they disagree with you.

Judson Phillips: Yes we do. You folks in the left do far worse. Patriotism is not something that cannot be measured. It can be. And you folks on the left, as a general rule are not patriotic. You do not love this country. You are embarrassed by us.

I hate to tell you this, but those of us in fly over country are the real Americans.

Embarrassed, yes. Not the "Oh, they're really right & deep down we realize we're just liberal losers" embarrassment this self-righteous shitheel imagines, but we're embarrassed. He should be too.

We'd add that they'll have to pry our disability check from our cold dead fingers, but it's more likely to be Judson Phillips' well-wrung neck they'll be prying from our cold dead fingers.

fshahzad1@gmail.com____________
OBJECTIVE
To work in a high-energy and challenging business environment that will promote professional and personal growth while adding significant value to my employer.

[ArrRRGgghh! We're being ill in the wastebasket right now. Blech. — Ed.]

CAREER HIGHLIGHTS
More than seven years of diversified experience with Fortune 500 Companies in accounting, budgeting, financial analysis, accountability analysis, revenue forecasting, client coordination, operations’ planning, research, contracts’ monitoring, building valuable customer relationships, and client profitability analysis. Prepared high level management reports for executive decision-making. Excellent analytical, oral and communication skills, keen perception, good team player, and accomplished result-oriented employee.
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
Affinion Group, 100 Connecticut Avenue, Norwalk, CT 06850
www.affiniongroup.com
Client Reporting Analyst (June 06-Present) Prepare monthly commission forecasting for high profile Affinion clients such as Citibank, Bank of America, Royal Bank of Scotland, Peoples Bank, US Bank, Wells Fargo and a couple of smaller clients. Analyze the variances and produce a memo with monthly commentaries. Provide analysis and support to our sales team with ad-hoc reporting, Insurance pro-formas, active member reports and solicitation-participation reports. Run hurdle models for new campaigns as part of client profitability team and provide feedback with inputs, comments and suggestions by changing variables such as marketing cost, premium cost and member cancel rates etc. It also requires cross-departmental inputs and support from strategy team, business intelligence, sales and accounting. Present “commission accuracy presentation” on quarterly bases to VP client profitability and CFO. Heavily involved in ongoing commission forecast model automation in excel which will save time preparing commission forecasts and increase forecast accuracy. Competitor analysis.
Elizabeth Arden Inc., 200 First Stamford Place, Stamford, CT 06902
http://corporate.elizabetharden.com
Financial Analyst (Feb 05- May 06) Analyzing and reporting results for the Elizabeth Arden EA) Mid-Tier business (mainly JCPenney and military customers), part of the Department Store Fragrance Group Business Unit (DSFG). Assisting in the development of the annual budget. Tracking all actual expenses against approved budgets. Reviewing and justifying all sales and marketing accruals relating to this SBU. Working across departments to develop forecasts on a bi-monthly basis. Preparing monthly commentary to explain variances to budget and prior year. Analyzing promotional spending. Supporting sales and marketing with financial analysis and reports.
Operation Analyst (May 2003 – Jan 05)
Overall management and analysis of account receivable operational deductions. Responsible for reducing accounts receivable write-offs, analysis and resolution of client pricing disputes, implementing policy and procedures to eliminate reoccurring collection issues, negotiating client settlements, evaluation of collection policies at main distribution facility and daily reconciliation of general ledger accounts.
Recovered over $2.5mil in “lost” revenue. Reduced day’s sales outstanding (DSO) from 70 to 55 days on assigned items. Decreased bad debt write-offs by 47% Increased overall collection department efficiency by developing and implementing a daily account progress/activity monitoring system Month end close.
Accounts Receivable Analyst (March 2001 - May 2003)
Using mainframe-based systems and software, prepare financial and business-related analysis in the area of Accounts Receivables. Responsible for the monitoring and negotiation of cash flow and payment cycle patterns, account reconciliation and the review and release of customer orders. Complies and prepares computer-generated reports, graphs, and charts of relevant data for assigned account portfolio. Assist in the developing of business policies, conducts special financial and business-related studies and cooperates with other departments in the preparation of account analyses. Evaluate credit limits, clear off deductions and track invoices. Daily Account Receivable Balancing to General Ledger. Developed standardized spreadsheets for the analysis of accounts receivables functions.
Sound Financial Technologies, 1 Dock Street, Stamford, CT 06902
Business Intern (June 2000 - December 2000) Designed, developed and updated website. Handled the logistics for potential customers coming on site to test and evaluate Company’s products. Conducted research for improved marketing of website and software products.

A rap sheet as long as your arm. How are people like this allowed to walk freely among us? We also see how little an elitist education does for you in the real world of religious & political violence. A point for TEA-Baggers.

Now that Newsweek has tripped & is falling down the stairway to the sewers, we'll start paying some attention.

Anyway, Billy's boy Franklin clarifying his view of the First Amendment. (Xians only, & only Xians.)

Well, sure, someone can try to make that argument. But you have—what is it?—80 percent of America claims to be of the Christian faith. OK, so there may be 20 percent that may be offended, but it won't be 20 percent.JM: I'm in the 80 percent, and I'm offended.FG: That I mention Jesus Christ [in prayer]?JM: No, sir, by what you said about Islam, because I think it's more divisive than unifying.FG: Nine years ago I said it was wicked and evil.JM: And you just repeated that here.FG: No, I repeated what I said nine years ago.JM: But you still believe it.FG:Sure. But, again, I don't go out and speak about it. I just have to ask you: what they do to women, is that wicked or evil?

He goes on. (Of course he goes on. It's in the Graham genes to love the sound of one's voice.)

JM: Are you suggesting that the Obama administration is soft on Islam?FG: I think the whole nation is soft on it. You have to go back to the Bush administration—I think they were soft on it, and I think this administration is too. No question. And there's still the concern with many people about what Obama really believes. Obama's father was a Muslim, so the Islamic world sees him as a Muslim. Now, he has told me personally that he believes in Jesus Christ, and he is a Christian. He said that to me again last week. And I said, "Mr. President, thank you for sharing that with me, I appreciate that." So I believe what he says. The Islamic world, though, they see him as one of their own. So if the president and his administration wants to cut guys like myself out, that's fine. But it's just sending a signal to the evangelical community that, you know, our people aren't important to him.

What is ++not-good to be soft on? Two things come immediately to mind: Communism, & crime. Now we find that America may be (Gasp! Horrors! Yada.) soft on a religion. Or two or three religions, as Junior G gets in his licks against the Hindoos, & Chinamen in general.

FG: I am who I am. I don't believe that you can get to heaven through being a Buddhist or Hindu. I think Muhammad only leads to the grave. Now, that's what I believe, and I don't apologize for my faith. And if it's divisive, I'm sorry.

Here we wonder if there's been a shift in theology. Our anti-theism would have us believe that Bible-thumpers expect pagans, Buddhists, et al. to end up in a Dante-inspired hell of flame & brimstone for eternity. Yet no mention of punishment for unconfessed sins, merely "the grave." So we're consigned to mere deadness after death, moldering away w/o consciousness? No whip-wielding demons to scourge us, not a pitchfork poked where the flames don't reach? Just the sweet ... of death? Sign us up for worm food now!

New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg told a Senate panel Wednesday that he strongly supports congressional efforts to close a "terror gap" in the nation's gun laws, which currently allow persons on a federal terrorist watch list to buy guns and explosives legally in the United States.

We suppose there's a law somewhere guaranteeing a right to keep explosives, bureaucratic no-fly list be damned. Or there will be one soon. Republicans: Appeasing The Terrorists Since Iran-Contra. (Just kidding. We know it goes back to John Brown, at least.)

The Naked Cowboy is one of Times Square's higher-profile kooks, but there are plenty of other people hanging out there who might raise eyebrows at the Des Moines Rotary Club. How do you know when activity in Times Square is suspicious? Don't people act suspiciously there all the time? I set out to see how much disturbing behavior I could encounter in Times Square during an hour and a half around lunchtime on a Tuesday. New York City's transit authority has popularized the slogan "If You See Something, Say Something" and asks the city's subway riders to "Be alert to unattended packages; Be wary of suspicious behavior; Take notice of people in bulky or inappropriate clothing; Report exposed wiring or other irregularities." I took these as my marching orders.

What she found. View the slideshow as well. One needn't be clinically paranoid for virtually everything to be suspicious.

W/ discussion of certain theories again popular (We once heard somewhere that good ideas drove bad ones out of circulation. No, huh?) at The NewYork Times we thought it more than serendipity that brought this filmed presentation to us. It may help to shine a light on such ideas.Or just provide pointless laffs about men & women, or marriage, or whatever the fuck is going on. (Warning: Ends w/ hideous religious corn. Wouldn't see that crap on CBS today!)

Found here, but until the guy learns to size his embedding, we'll continue to steal his crap in its entirety.

Sunda Croonquist, whose act for years has been to describe her life as a half-black, half-Swedish woman who marries into a Jewish family, was sued two years ago after her mother-in-law, sister-in-law and brother-in-law said her jokes were holding them up to public ridicule.

In a 21-page ruling issued on Friday, US District Judge Mary L. Cooper of New Jersey concluded that the examples they cited - including one in which Croonquist says her sister-in-law's voice sounds like a cat in heat - fell under the category of protected speech.

Many of the jokes, Ms Cooper said, were clearly statements of opinion and not fact and therefore protected by the First Amendment.

The cat-in-heat joke, the judge said, quoting from a previous court decision, was "colourful, figurative rhetoric that reasonable minds would not take to be factual".

It found that those who generally slept for less than six hours a night were 12% more likely to experience a premature death over a period of 25 years than those who consistently got six to eight hours' sleep. Evidence for the link was unequivocal, the researchers concluded.

It also concluded that those who consistently sleep more than nine hours a night can be more likely to die early. Oversleeping itself is not seen as a risk but as a potential indicator of underlying ailments.

"Whilst short sleep may represent a cause of ill health, long sleep is believed to represent more an indicator of ill health," said Professor Francesco Cappuccio, who led the study and is head of the Sleep, Health and Society programme at the University of Warwick.

Damned if you do, yada. Obviously funded by corporate interests in an effort to increase productivity & general suffering.

"Modern society has seen a gradual reduction in the average amount of sleep people take, and this pattern is more common amongst full-time workers, suggesting that it may be due to societal pressures for longer working hours and more shift-work. On the other hand, the deterioration of our health status is often accompanied by an extension of our sleeping time.

"Consistently sleeping six to eight hours per night may be optimal for health. The duration of sleep should be regarded as an additional behavioural risk factor, or risk marker, influenced by the environment and possibly amenable to change through both education and counselling as well as through measures of public health aimed at favourable modifications of the physical and working environments."

Not just Thailand's Red Shirts, now the gummint haters of Nepal, a punk little country so high in the Himalayas the local commies can barely breathe, are showing America's aging losers how to do it. The Tea-Bagging slobs may talk big about getting their Alinsky on, but here are Marxists gittin'-r-done!

KATMANDU, Nepal (AP) — Nepal’s Maoist opposition blocked streets leading to key government offices Wednesday on the fourth day of their crippling general strike to demand the prime minister’s resignation, but the government vowed not to bow to protesters’ pressure.

Protesters hoped to disrupt the government by blocking streets leading to the Singhadurbar complex which houses key offices and ministries, but many government ministers already had entered the complex under police protection before sunrise.

The Maoists, known to use violence to back their strike calls, have demanded that residents halt all travel and keep businesses and schools closed since Sunday in their campaign to get Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal to resign and hand power to a Maoist-led government.

The strike has shut down most businesses, schools and transport, with daily activity grinding to a standstill

The strike comes as Nepal’s Constituent Assembly, elected to draw up a new constitution, struggles to draft the charter before its term expires May 28.

Home Minister Bhim Rawal told reporters Wednesday that the prime minister was not going to bow to the pressure from the protesters and does not plan to resign.

Rawal said the government was working to bring life back to normal, including deploying police to protect banks, which were expected to begin reopening late Wednesday after heeding strike calls to stay closed.

Rawal also said police would escort additional convoys of trucks carrying essential goods into the city, after escorting a few trucks with fuel and food early Tuesday.

The Maoists and parties in Nepal’s ruling coalition have failed to reach any agreements despite several meetings between their leaders in the past three days.

The standoff has raised fears of renewed violence in Nepal, where the Maoists ended their decade-old insurgency and joined a peace process in 2006. They won elections in 2008 and briefly led a coalition government, but a dispute over the army chief’s firing split the coalition.

We're still waiting, punk-ass chumps. Afraid you'll miss the early-bird dinner at the generic diner chain in your empty, soulless suburban area if you have to go out & block the streets? Or did your Medicare-paid croaker tell you your about-to-explode heart won't let you sit or stand for more than 30 mins.? Weaklings, your time is over.

Tuesday, May 4, 2010

In light of recent statements from esteemed moron members of the United Snakes Senate concerning your rights & citizenship, and as an antidote to video infestation.To quote Art Fein: You don't have to SEE music to enjoy it.

The Ig & band still rocking. This, apparently, is news, or at least review-worthy. No critique (What can be added at this date?) just a reminder that this force of nature still walks (humps, lobs, capers, & pirouettes, also) among us.

Apparently they're out in support of the third or whatever release/re-release of a remastered/remixed/back-to-the-original mix, & accompanying DVD & also, which we mentioned/linked/copied outright some time ago (Couple wks., at least.) but why be arsed even to link that? Huh? Really, why?

They're playing their 1973 album, Raw Power, tonight, leaving the show uncontaminated by weaker latter-day material. With it comes no shortage of energy; that would be impossible in the face of the sheer wall of blues-punk pulsating through the huge stacks of man-sized amps on stage. It's inescapable – they've got everything turned up to eleven; the kick drum, especially, is beating through my chest like an augmented heart. It's primal, and it's unutterably thrilling.

Yes, we pulled "force of nature" out of the Scrabble: Cliché Version sack, but it's not (yet) at the point where "turned up to eleven" is bandied about w/o irony here.

From The Land Of Ten Thousand Lakes & a Bachmann, Minnesota's completely Goofy Old Party bring us their gubernatorial candidate, Minnesota State Sen. Tom Emmer, another ante-bellum Southerner who seems to have migrated as far north as he could get & still remain in these United Snakes.

"Oh oh, hey by the way, we also apparently have to look at this country and be extremely critical of the United States of America, and start kissing the rear end of the people on the other side of the Atlantic," Emmer said mockingly. "That's ridiculous, and I'm sick and tired of hearing it. I'm hearing it out of Washington, now I'm hearing it here. This is a great country, Rep. Knuth."

If it's so fucking great, Senator, why are you trying to break it up?

Emmer was first elected to the Minnesota House of Representatives in 2004. He is a co-author of a proposed state constitutional amendment that would, to borrow the words of Nigel Tufnel, turn the Tenth Amendment all the way up to 11, with Minnesota preemptively nullifying all federal laws unless a state supermajority consents to them. Here is the key quote from the amendment's text: "A federal law does not apply in Minnesota unless that law is approved by a two-thirds vote of the members of each house of the legislature and is signed by the governor. Before voting to approve a federal law, each legislator must individually affirm that the legislator has read the federal law and understands it."

We'll type it here & now: Just Another Blog™ stands firmly against affirmative action programs for the stupid & willfully ignorant, & calls out the Minnesota Republican Party for its support of people like this Emmer idiot. Where's that meritocracy, reactionaries? (They like a mediocracy, you know. No elitists or thinkers involved there.)

The problem with the April 20 spill is that it isn't really a spill: It‘s a gush, like an underwater oil volcano. A hot column of oil and gas is spurting into freezing, black waters nearly a mile down, where the pressure nears a ton per inch, impossible for divers to endure. Experts call it a continuous, round-the-clock calamity, unlike a leaking tanker, which might empty in hours or days.

"Everything about it is unprecedented," said geochemist Christopher Reddy, an oil-spill expert and head of the Coastal Ocean Institute at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. "All our knowledge is based on a one-shot event…. With this, we don't know when it's going to stop."

Accidents have occurred before in which oil has gushed from damaged wells, he said. But he knew of none in water so deep.

Laptoppers may want to look into one of those cooling fan deals. We just got one; the devil-box is definitely cooler, the on-board fan hasn't gone into overdrive once (a common event) & the area above the hard-drive (below our left wrist) is much cooler.

Added benefit: Pop-out legs, raising the screen about three inches if desired. Easier viewing, better posture, more ergonomic for the paws. Hell, just raising the box off the desk may be all the cooling it needs, but we're not paying directly for the juice, so what do we care? And extending the life of the laptop more than offsets added electric use. Cram that down your throat, eco-freaks!

Sloth Level:RED! (For "Relax ...") Would be too much trouble (Standing up would be the most bothersome.) to take a picture, upload it, & all that. Imagination, people!

E-Z 4 U

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